In manufactured housing, it is necessary that the wall and ceiling components be assembled quickly, by a construction which will have the appearance of custom building. Particularly in the mobile home industry, the approach to the assembly of ceiling panels has been to attach them to rafters from below by means of staples, screws, nails, or other mechanical attaching means penetrating the panel from the decorative side, and thereafter to cover the attaching means with decorative means made as attractive as possible. Some examples of such means include rosettes, paint, and batten strips inserted into the panel over recessed portions attached by the staples or other attaching means. U.S. Pat. No. 3,545,154 is an example of the latter construction. Such construction can either feature staples driven by a stapler with their ends maintained parallel, as in U.S. Pat. No. 2,765,465, or so as to diverge outwardly around an anvil portion of the stapler, as in U.S. Pat. No. 2,765,466. In any event because most systems have required the attachment be made from the decorative side, they have been characterized by a lack of a uniformly smooth, unbroken surface characteristic of a custom-built home. Even joint treatment and paint as the decorative cover do not always prevent "nail-popping" resulting from shrinkage in the wood framing.
Thus, there has been considerable need for a means of mechanical attachment of panels to form a wall or ceiling which is done from a point that will not show or cause a break in the plane of the decorative surface of the panels. At least, breaks must be minimized. Mechanical fasteners, as opposed to chemical adhesives, have been particularly required in ceiling construction, due to the large size panels involved (4 feet by 12 feet), and by the fact that, in many cases, vapor barriers are required which prevent the use of adhesive.
Floor and ceiling constructions have been provided wherein divergent members such as staples have penetrated from and into the back surface only of ceiling board, but such constructions have suffered disadvantages. One such construction has featured metal members attached to the underside of the rafters and extending the full width of the panel, staples being driven in a straddling fashion over the metal members and into the back of the panel so as to diverge the staple points. The difficulty with this construction has been that the warping which is so characteristic of rafters has prevented the metal members which are first attached thereto from being securely attached to the flat, planar ceiling panel.
Still another construction has featured clips which do not extend a substantial distance across the panel, but rather are attached at only one end thereof to only one rafter. Such clips provide inadequate reinforcement so that rigidity between rafters comes from the board alone.